Amazon To Go Head-To-Head With Spotify And iRadio By Year’s End [Report]

Amazon is reported to be in discussions with music labels to launch a streaming music service for its Amazon Prime subscription members. Will it be more like Spotify, or iTunes Radio, though?

According to Recode, Amazon executives have been in discussions with music labels for the past few months. The basic pitch:

Amazon gives away a Netflix-style video service as a way to reward Prime members, who pay $79 a year and get free two-day shipping, among other perks. So if they’re willing to do that — under the theory that the cost of the video is worth it, because Prime members buy a lot more stuff from Amazon than nonmembers — why not make the service even more attractive with free music?

Earlier this year, Amazon told Wall Street that it may raise the price of Prime by as much as $40, to $119 a year.

Being an Amazon Prime member is a sick deal already, between free two-day shipping and the Amazon Prime library, but additional music would further beef up its attractiveness, especially if the price of the service were to raise. Even so, Amazon’s major liability has always been giving Prime users compelling ways of discovering Prime Video content, a la Netflix. I don’t see that changing if Amazon starts streaming free music too.

About the author:

John Brownlee is a Contributing Editor. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.